Tom Lehrer's "Irish Ballad" I am including his dialogue of his introduction, you might have something to distract you from the lyrics.
To read or not to read, that is the, INTRODUCTION:
Now I'd like to turn to the folk song, which has become in recent years the particularly fashionable form of idiocy among the self-styled intellectual.
We find that people who deplore the level of current popular songs -- although I admit they do seem to be recording almost anything these days.
Have you heard Sesue Hayakawa's record of "Remember Pearl Harbor"?
These same people who deplore the level of current popular songs and yet will sit around enthralled singing
"Jimmy Crack Corn and I Don't Care" or "Green Grow the Rushes, Oh!" -- whatever that means.
At any rate, for this elite I have here an ancient Irish ballad, which was written a few years ago, and which is replete with all
the accoutrements of this art form. In particular, it has a sort of idiotic refrain, in this case "Rickety-tickety-tin" you'll notice cropping up from time to time, running through, I might add, interminable verses.
The large number of verses being a feature expressly designed to please the true devotees of the folk song who seem to find singing fifty verses of "On Top of Old Smokey" is twice as enjoyable as singing twenty-five

This type of song also has what is known technically in music as a modal tune, which means -- for the benefit of any layman who may have wandered in this evening -- that I play a wrong note every now and then.

This song though does differ strikingly from the genuine folk ballad in that in this song the words which are supposed to rhyme - actually do I, ah, I really should say that I do not direct these remarks against the vast army of folk song lovers, but merely against that peculiar hard core who seem to equate authenticity with artistic merit and illiteracy with charm..
Oh, one more thing. One of the more important aspects of public folk singing is audience participation, and this happens to be a good song for group singing, so if any of you feel like joining in with me on this song,
I'd appreciate it if you would leave right now.